La Famille Bélier | 2014 | French Comedy-Drama
Let's settle this first
You will most likely never hear me talk about a great holiday to France or the language I adore so much because in all honestly, over the years (actually the two years I had mandatory French in my classes) I have developed some sort of hate for the language. I didn't get it, that was one reason but on the other hand I had a horrible bitchy teacher who I couldn't stand. I was so happy when I could drop that class, lol. Since then, I actually just didn't enjoy anything French anymore and would usually turn off the tv when something came up with French audio. Exceptions are there though, sometimes I can tolerate it. But today you will find me talking about a very rare case where it started by me tolerating it, and soon even enjoying it! A movie with full French audio dragged me into the story completely and the singing made me so emotional listening to it as well. Again, it's proven, language doesn't matter when it comes to music!
Now let's get to the good stuff: La Famille Belier
La Famille Belier is a French comedy-drama film directed by Eric Lartigua. The film received six nominations at the 40th Cesar Awards, winning the most promising actress for Louane Emera. Source
Before you start watching this movie, I have to warn you. Don't be blind-sighted by the pretty blonde who is the star of this movie, because let me tell you her parents are a bunch of weirdos. What's even more important is that Paula (played by Louane) is the only one in her family who isn't deaf. Both her parents and her little brother are deaf and she experiences quite the struggle dealing with them during this school year. With the parents being deaf, you can witness quite a few really strange situations, for example when Paula needs to translate for her parents at a doctor's visit for a yeast infection down there. Yes, down there! I won't spoil how that went down. pun intended
The family has a farm to run and they all have their own tasks. Paula's biggest task is translating for her parents, whenever needed. This will at some point get out of hand as she struggles to combine her personal life as a teenager with the demand of her parents who seem to need her more and more. If she refuses, they aren't very understanding and this causes a bit of a wedge between them.
The best part of this story
During one of her musical classes at school, Paula is asked to sing a part and for some reason, the teacher hears something in her voice and tells her to sing louder. Paula doesn't seem to enjoy the singing much yet and even seems a bit scared to sing loud, she is way too shy to be the centre of attention. But when she gets matched with a guy in her class that she secretly seems to like, sometimes starts to bloom. It's from this moment when the music is starting to become important in her life to the point where she will have to practice daily, no matter if her parents need her or not. Will she be able to combine the demanding life her parents have created for her being the only family member that can hear and speak? Or will she have to make a choice between her own life and the life with her family?
I can't tell you, it would spoil the fun. You will have to go and watch it yourself!
No spoiler, just a little musical teaser
What I can do is give you a little musical teaser of the movie. It turns out that this girl has quite a voice! I know now that she is discovered during The Voice and this girl truly has the voice of an angel. I love her voice and I still enjoy listening to this song even without watching the movie and therefore I want to share this clip with you. This is the song she sings during an audition in the movie, I hope you enjoy it as much as I did:
I hope that I piqued your interest to watch this movie, even if you don't like to watch movies in foreign languages, give it a try I'd say. It's still on my device, while I usually delete movies once I've seen them (even if they're good) because I don't often watch movies that I know I will watch again. This movie triggered a lot of emotions and it also made me feel good, it's on the list to watch again in the future.
If you've seen it already, let me know what you think about it in a comment, please!
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I liked that movie, got some tears in my eyes!
Haha, me too! Me too!
I like foreign stuffs. Recently been watching a series called 'Biohackers' and believe it's German?
When you said German, I looked it up, as I've watched some episodes of a show that I didn't finish (forgot, other came to path lol) and didn't quite remember which one it was. I will now head over to Netflix to check it and put it in my list :) lol I think it was nice, but need to watch an episode to be sure..
Did you see Penoza? Or Undercover?
Penoza, no, Undercover - yes! Got a soft spot for mafia-type crime shows.
Oh then DEFO watch Penoza! Wrote a review the day before yesterday about the tv show (5 seasons, yes!!!) and will write one about the final chapter (the movie ) as well in the next days.
Undercover is great, watching the second season again now, followed by the new season haha. Defo review worthy once I'm done.
oh and then you've probably seen Queen of the South already? That one I loved as well :)
No actually, but it's in my list😁
Ohhh please watch it if you like this genre, so good! And it has quite a few episodes in all those seasons I think. Good for some binge-watching when you have the time.
My daughter and I always go back and forth with dub and sub
She is Team Sub and I would prefer dub only so I can do some chores like folding clothes while watcing
But I have scribbled this down for when time permits :D
It's really a good one, and the dub/sub thing you have to figure out yourself haha. If I wouldn't have subs here, I would have missed a lot of the context lol... but hey, I suck at French :)
The movie sounds interesting. I'm currently trying to learn French so it may be a good movie for me in that regards. I just watched a really strange French film called Titane. Strange is putting it mildly though lol.
If you're trying to learn French and need a movie to watch, then defo go for it.
I don't know Titane, but honestly, I usually avoid the French ones, as I mentioned above haha.
What kind of strange though? Of course, you made me curious!
I mean like very strange - like a woman gets impregnated by a car kind of strange. Then she kills a bunch of people, impersonates a missing boy in order to live with his father, leaks motor oil from her belly and... other places. Then there are the strange dancing raves at the local fire hall with all the firefighters.
So kind of artsy I guess...lol
Definitely not mainstream. But it did win a few film festival awards.
I'm assuming it's a metaphor for something but I'm not sure what exactly. I've been meaning to look up an interview with the director to get more insight but haven't gotten around to it yet.
Oh if it won some movie awards it's probably indeed very artsy.
I usually don't like those kinds of movies much, unless I actually get the meaning behind it lol. But that's rarely the case the first time watching :) It's probably just not my thing. This one sounds too weird to try watching, especially with the French audio haha
Yeah you would be safer just to skip this one there are some fairly gruesome scenes as well.
I was looking for days in order to find some proper comedy movie, and this one fulfilled my expectations! So if you don't mind some laughs and tears - it's recommended , pretty much realistic story.
Thanks for sharing. 🙌🏻
Oh, I'm so happy you enjoyed it. It was a good one indeed. I saved it on my device to watch it again as it was laughs and tears for sure, but overall a feel-good one. I enjoyed it as well.
This seems a good family movie. 🙂
!1UP
Thanks for the review. It sounds like a great movie but I probably wont watch because I don't like subtitles and I don't know French.